Christmas and the spirit of giving

Last night, my choir had its second of two performances. It went swimmingly. It was wonderful. The choir surprised me with a bunch of flowers. It's a really lovely arrangement, full of lilies and roses.

I went to pack up my things from the kids' play room, and what did I find there but a kid, playing. She was all, "look at me!" and jumping on a beanbag chair. We chatted a little while about how cool it is to jump on a beanbag chair. I went to move my flowers, and she was immediately next to me with two questions. Why do you have flowers? and Can I have one?

I knew in that moment that I was within my rights to say "no," and gently say an age-appropriate thing about respecting other peoples' stuff, but... there was another thought in my mind. What am I gonna do with these flowers? Put them in a vase in my house. And they'll be pretty for awhile, and then they'll wither up. And they'll die, and I'll put them in the compost.

So I gave her a rose. Because, what the heck. I had like four, and she only wanted one. I carefully extracted a rose and checked it for thorns, and off she went to show everyone.

This story is just a small and happy reminder that love is a flower that becomes even more beautiful when shared. I was given a bouquet, which was happy for me; I gave away a rose, which spread the joy two ways. The rest of the night, she walked around with that rose and didn't let it go even once. She walked out the door still holding it.


Choir flowers :) on Twitpic

Merry Christmas, and I hope that a blessing comes your way by way of blessing someone else. It is a great thing. :)

"A Diner Club Christmas": radio, album, shoshosho

I cram so much into my one little life. Certain aspects of this are admirable, then... others are stupid.

For example, the past week. Jam-packed each night of the week, including Sunday. Now when it's Friday night, everyone else is out and I'm home too tired to move from the space-heated recliner corner.

And I really don't mind that one bit. Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

Anyway, there's this supergroup of us: the Paper Janes (Shane and Jess), Battleshy Youths (Michael, and Andrew, and Mitch) slash the Honey Badgers (Erin with Michael), and myself. We recorded the Christmas album "A Diner Club Christmas," which arrived on Monday, and we promptly began selling them to everyone we know, and will continue to do so awhile (please don't hesitate to comment or contact me if you want a copy!). I have already signed a few copies for co-workers. ^^

Okay. It's not like I've never played music with people before, and it's not like I'm opposed to it. I'm known to appear at many formal and informal jam sessions, as whim dictates. I fulfilled all my small ensemble requirements in college. To be blunt, though: I chose guitar so that I would not have to rely on anyone other than myself. I am my own one-woman band. I like the independence. (Which is probably why I am still single, and pretty happy being just that.)

Despite my hermit-like inclinations, playing with this group has been pretty delightful. Not that we have a name or anything.

Sunday we were on Hometown Heroes. I can't say enough good things about Mark Rogers, who invited us to be on the show. Hometown Heroes is run by WSTW out of Wilmington. Being in the studio is kind of magical. I've been in radio stations before, and the magic never really wears off. It's tingly, it gets under your skin, it tickles. You're stuck in an eternal grin. The half-hour in the studio really flew by, sadly, but there IS a podcast available!



The show which we were on air promoting went off last night. The Queen - wow. Onstage downstairs at the Queen is an experience and a half. The best part about it (okay, one of the best parts) was the sound guys. They were so good to us. We had such needs - instruments and equipment and vocals and man, what a headache. Luckily Michael's on top of things and the sound guys were really nice on top of being dedicated and smart about things. We played well and I'm hoping there's a podcast coming out sometime... :) I had a ton of people complimenting my mad uke skillz.

That's my brief on that. There's a show or two on the horizon, and Christmas still to get through with the choir, and plenty of dancing for the new year.

A Diner Club Christmas! Now available!

This is technically my first album release. ^^ These are 7 of the 11 tracks recorded. Make sure to get a hard copy if you'd like the FULL album! All the proceeds to to charity. ^^



And don't forget about our upcoming show at the Queen!

And there's a possibility I'mma be on the radio Sunday. Stay tuned for deets!

November madness

The madness never really stops!

So. What's going on.

• Playing the Gathering Place at Klondike Kate's tonight
  
• Adventuring out with Michael tomorrow for to see and play at an open mic at the Steel City Coffeehouse in Phoenixville, PA (and seeing superfan Cara!)
  
• Adventuring further on my own this weekend for dancing, dancing, musicking at Head for the Hills; I don't count my ducks before they hatch but I'm hoping to have some cool video to show you afterwards so that you can all be jealous that I had so much fun and got to make so many new friends. But I am really terrible at taking videos/photos of anything I do because I would rather be enjoying myself in the moment.
  
• Announced today: our supergroup dealiebobber (myself, Paper Janes, Battleshy Youths, ???) will be playing at the Queen, downstairs (!) on Thursday, December 1. Tickets are ON SALE! :) Come out and see us.
  

I reckon we'll probably have to practice or something ridiculous like that...!

I think we'll be featuring some of our Christmas tunes from the album, which has been all mastered up and is totally awesome-sounding. Really, seriously. A great product from a great time which was started by a great vision.

For now, I run, for I actually did not have time to blog this evening but oh well. :3

Christmas in October

There are always, always, always, excuses. Mary Oliver probably puts it best in her poem, Kookaburras: "In every heart there is a coward and a procrastinator." She goes on to say, though, "In every heart there is a god of flowers, just waiting / to stride out of a cloud and lift its wings."

Her poem has a strong and stern message: Do not choose the former of the two, if you can possibly avoid it.

See, there are things in life, balances to be struck, bargains to be made. People answer this question - what's more important today? - while ignoring this question - what's more important for my life?

Yesterday, a group of us (incl. Battleshy Youths, Paper Janes, and various folks) chose to answer the second question in complete and utter defiance of the first.

And it was rockin'.

A lot of what's real and good in life makes no sense on the surface. Looking from the outside, you'd have seen a group of young people who have homework and school and jobs and obligations; you'd have seen them temporarily discard most of their obligations, including the forfeit of sleep; one of them has a recording studio in the basement, for some reason; his folks are somehow okay with about 20 people making use of all but a few rooms in the house for practicing, collaborating, eating, and hanging out; the house, by midnight, is littered with coffee mugs and bowls of chili; musicians climb in and out of the studio with a menagerie of instruments, some loud and obnoxious; and the last few stragglers finally leave the house at 3 AM to dodge herds of deer as they navigate through rural Pennsylvania to capture a few precious hours of sleep.

I know a number of people who would NOT be okay with this happening in or around their house.

So what's under the surface that makes it all worth it?

Friends, new ones and old ones. The practicing of creativity and generosity. Giving help, accepting help, asking for help. Encouragement to make full use of the special and unique gifts given to each of us.

Also, we possibly recorded some sweet tunes somewhere in there.

What a day.

Christmas shenanigans

Last week kept me on my toes. It was Christmas week, which is a pretty musically busy time. Somehow, I not only got through it -- I aced it with flying colors, and have videos to prove it.

Here's one of the videos of my choir performing at our Adoration service.



We had two performances. They did really, really well. I had so many people tell me how it touched them, how beautiful it was. It's just another way for God to show how beautiful His love is, to give us music and art that touches us in ways we cannot explain.

When I showed up to warm up the choir, I was approached by my pastor -- "do you play bass?" I really have no actual experience playing the bass, but... it's just a jumbo guitar without the top two strings. So I ended up playing a few carols along with the worship team. Honestly, I do enjoy having a little odd challenge thrown my way. Something that takes me out of my comfort zone. You don't get very far by staying within that particular zone.


Annnnnnd here's the video of my arrangement of 23 carols mushed into 4 minutes.



I threw this together on a Thursday, Shane's show was Saturday, and I recorded this the following Wednesday. I would have done it a little differently with more time, but it was a fun little project, anyway. And it turns out, my camera takes half-decent videos, which might lead to more videos in the future...

Choir director? Who, me?

I love my choir. It's great to bring people together to sing. But choir directorship is not something I ever would have imagined for myself.

From what I can recall, I hated my voice when I was a kid. The way it sounded was just really repulsive to me. I knew that I could carry a tune, but I believed that the quality of my voice was so terrible that I should do everyone a favor and just shut up.

So when I got to college, I wanted a music degree. Fine, they said. You'll have to join a large ensemble. And guess what? There's no large ensemble for classical guitar, so... you'll be in Women's Glee, Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays from noon to one.

Apparently, nobody had informed them of the horror that was my vocal quality. So I just bit my tongue, accepted my fate, and figured on lip syncing my way through four years of college.

Turns out you sing a lot, if you're a music student. Even outside of Women's Glee, there were ear training classes where you had to sing different musical intervals, eventually building up to sight-singing in solfege. (You know... Do, Re, Mi...)

Here's what I discovered:

1. Choir directors can be really nice, encouraging people (who sometimes devote Wednesdays to the color purple)
   
2. People did not wince from what I envisioned was my harsh, grating tone
   
3. You will be very popular in a choir if you have a good ear
   
4. Singing is a fun, unifying experience that is just plain good for the soul
   

It made me a little mad that I had been cheated out of such a great thing for so long. It made me mad that some people try to make singing something so lofty and inaccessible, try to tell others they can't sing when they clearly can. We're not all going to be on Broadway, but we can carry a tune and we don't sound half bad doing it, thankyouverymuch.

Enter my six years of directing small community choirs. Starting with my dorm and lately including the church choir. It's always been a mix -- some seasoned choir veterans, some people wanting to try for the first time. I've never auditioned anyone. I depend completely upon the goodwill and kindness of my singers to forgive each others' mistakes and help each other to create a beautiful performance.

So I'm really excited that we're coming up on a performance again for Christmas this year. They sound great, but their hearts are even better.